PED Expert Weighs-In on Jon Jones’ Latest USADA Flag

Since it was announced that Jon Jones has been notified of a potential doping violation, his manager’s claimed a contaminated product is certainly behind the flag, and a PED expert seems to agree.

A couple of weeks ago it was announced that Jones has tested positive for a banned substance, following his stoppage win over Daniel Cormier on July 29th. Since then it’s been reported Jones tested positive for the anabolic steroid Turinabol, but his agent has argued the flag is due to a contaminated product the champion must have taken. Further, Jones’ team has pointed to the other tests he took, tied to UFC 214, which he passed.

Well, recently PED expert Angel Heredia Hernandez was a guest on Submission Radio. While discussing Jones’ case, here is some of what he had to say (quotes via Bloody Elbow.com):

“If he would have been using way before then, he eventually would have been positive on the 21-day testing before the fight. But he was negative, then he came out positive.”

“Frankly, the testing itself, it lacks of credibility for a lot of reasons,” Hernandez said. “We could go on and on, and I could be very specific in terms of chemistry, but I don’t want to mislead the people that listen. It’s just the fact that they are detecting six different metabolites, and one of them stays longer than up to seven weeks. But the most intriguing part of it is that some of those metabolites, they’re not really confirmed that they are actually coming from that Turinabol structure.”

“At this point, in my opinion, I really want to believe that the only thing that could have caused the positive test for this guy could have been that the supplement was contaminated…” Hernandez added.

Now, even if Jones’ team is able to demonstrate that the positive test was due to a contaminated product he took, chances are, the champion will still be suspended for sometime. Jones’ camp was able to demonstrate this last year, when he was flagged by USADA, and “Bones” was still suspended for a year, as the commission deemed he acted recklessly.

Hernandez will reportedly server as an expert witness for Jones, during his appeal process.